liamwire

I suspect an argument could made that, through either existing mindshare or further marketing, unwitting consumers would ultimately install alternative browsers (in significant enough numbers), and with that, open themselves up to these security concerns. I’m not making a claim either way, however, to be clear.

I found Sam Harris’ book on Free Will, named as such, to be extraordinarily compelling. It’s short, at 96 pages, and I feel worth the read.

Preface: I don’t know how sandboxing works on iOS beyond broad concepts, and there’s going to be implementation details I’m unaware of. As a result, please read this as curious speculation, rather than anything approximating an authoritative statement.

My understanding is that WebKit is the only rendering engine permitted on iOS as a security precaution, ostensibly taking Apple at face value and in good faith.

Numerous zero-days on iOS have targeted WebKit in the past, and to a large extent this makes sense to me. Browsers have become one of the most common malware vectors in the modern era, which isn’t surprising given their entire purpose is to access and execute/render external code.

Given that fact, and the significant attack surface area that opens up, Apple’s stance, in my nebulous interpretation, is that having any other rendering engine permitted to run in iOS presents an unmanageable number of potential vectors for more widespread malware on the platform. (Arguments about their resources aside, we know adding engineers to a problem space doesn’t scale in linear fashion towards solving those problems.)

Apple’s vocal focus on privacy and safety constitutes a significant aspect of their product marketing, and it makes sense they’d want to walk-the-walk, so to speak, to ensure their product lives up to the claims they make.

Now, given that Apple already have trouble keeping up with WebKit vulnerabilities, it’s believable that they’re being entirely genuine* in arguing against the addition of additional browser engines that they’d need to keep up with, on the grounds that doing so presents a real risk to their product’s core value proposition, and by extension, their users.

*However, it’s also important not to over-ascribe anthropomorphic traits to a corporation, and it’s completely valid to argue that Apple benefit heavily from this narrative. Indeed, both can be true.

Perhaps provide a counter argument, rather than a hollow dictate, eg. why that comparison isn’t valid.

What’s your field of study for your degree?

I came to the same thought immediately upon reading the article. Like a memory leak, but with calories instead of bytes.

I’m absolutely with you here. I walked into it having intentionally avoided the trailers, and treating the whole existence as a thrown-bone, a “here’s one last throwback to something truly special, in a time when we could all use some familiarity,” while remaining self-aware, and tongue-in-cheek. It knew what it was, looked that right in the face, and said ‘don’t take it too seriously.’ And I didn’t, and it was great.

You may well have already, but if not, please consider getting tested for sleep apnea. Waking up in an anxious jolt, with chest pain, or a feeling of breathlessness, are all warning signs that you’re breathing is stopping during the night.

It may be a waste of time, or it may save years of your life. All the best.

Do you know which is the largest contributor?

I can see replenishment of the water tables being a concern, if everyone (or a good percentage, at least) started doing so. Add to that concerns about disrupting existing ecosystems, and I could see at least a partway compelling case that could be made. In fairness, there are likely to be at least an equal number of counter arguments that could be levied as well, but such is the nature of governance.

Per any transaction, regardless of size.

“Recently, I was asked if I was going to fire an employee who made a mistake that cost the company $600,000. No, I replied, I just spent $600,000 training him. Why would I want somebody to hire his experience?”

— Thomas J. Watson, allegedly

> As opposed to a oxygen-poor atmosphere?

My interpretation of that sentence is that it performs better at lower altitudes, where the density of oxygen (and the other atmospheric gases as a whole) is higher.

I think you’re vastly a) underestimating the time it takes to bring a new product line all the way into production in the auto industry, and b) overestimating the true demand for such a product, Hacker News and adjacent crowds notwithstanding – peoples broadly have come to expect those simple features at practically every price point, as evidenced by the ubiquity of said features in the market.

You’ve very likely forced Amazon’s hand here wrt egress pricing, and yet this move alone has won my business even if everything else was equal. Bravo.

I got a full-blown belly laugh out of this, thank you.

I cannot imagine sincerely believing a statement that is so blatantly wrong. Moreover, there’s nothing ‘potentially’ carcinogenic about smoking, it is a known carcinogen.

I’ve experienced this carry-over into my verbal communication with my partner before, it’s nice to have a name for it.

I don’t think the demand curve is matching supply at this point, and the processors, while powerful, will be outdated in a relatively short timeframe. Utilising them in a build farm would be one way to put any excess to good use.

I feel this is a dishonest take. I’ve seen the moderators leave up some pretty egregious violations of the site rules because it fostered good discussion, which seems to be at the heart of HN.

However, good discussion ultimately requires respect for one another, and it seems maybe that thinking is not bilateral in your case. I’d encourage you to introspect on why you may be finding resistance wherever you look.

I remember reading about this maybe a few years ago, and it’s such a brilliant use.

Ostensibly this is the exact opposite function one wants out of a search tool, obscuring results. For Microsoft to design such an egregious UX for one of their key platforms, the incentives must be staggering. Calling this a dark pattern doesn’t go far enough, in my opinion. It’s outright user-hostile.

> And please don't say "that's different, it affects other people!"

Preempting the flaw in your strawman doesn’t invalidate it. A woman choosing to abort a pregnancy has no bearing on anyone but her. In contrast, the anti-vaccine crowd both directly, and indirectly, contribute to the propagation of disease.

Your right to bodily autonomy stops at society’s doorstep, which is broadly agreeing that the unvaccinated don’t get to participate in the non-essential aspects of society, otherwise furthering the risk to everyone else without reason.

You keep making these assertions, failing to back them up with anything other than hand-waving in the direction of entirely unrelated programs. You then respond to requests for citations, or even just an elaboration, with the near-verbatim ‘do your own research.’

Chiefly, how does that further the conversation? More pointedly, why should we listen to you?

Credentialism in this arena is valid, and what I currently see are multiple subject matter experts, albeit with a bias/incentive towards believing in themselves, versus you. Please substantiate your claims, or word them more carefully as to reflect them being conjecture.

Or, Occam’s razor. A sufficiently complex engineering task can exist such that it fully taxes even international, multi-nation state-backed parallel capacity for engineering, and science.

This is already demonstrated by your own examples provided, just at a smaller scale.

If there were ever such a project to push against the capacity of our ability to do truly enormous, complex engineering, I’d say a massive, cutting-edge fusion reactor is as good a candidate as one could propose.

Moreover, the economic and educational stimulus these projects provide cannot be ignored when accounting for the indirect, long-tail returns this project, and those similar, provide.

Put another way: ostensibly, achieving net energy gain from fusion is the end of our near-term (energy) needs, conveniently breezing over the evolution and refinements of any system, as well as delivery and storage, but these are paths that are comparatively well mapped out. It then follows that, short of catastrophic losses prior to succeeding (which while not a given per se, seems more a function of time than of ability outright), any reasonable cost is worthwhile. Reasonable, in this context, meaning one that doesn’t bankrupt, or otherwise severely impact the participants in a negative fashion. Given the scale of these budgets vs. that of social welfare programs, military spending, etc. I don’t see that as an issue worth being concerned over. One can know the budget has been exceeded, without that also bringing down the house.

Ultimately, to an extent you’re asserting a false dichotomy. It can be true that there’s continued, substantial progress towards the stated goals of these projects, even if the budgets, horizons, and timelines aren’t to your taste. It can also be true that there’s waste, inefficiencies, and even (both legalised and otherwise) corruption. One does not preclude the other.

I’d like to submit Botox as an example that, yes, it can be.

Somewhat-tangentially related: I’ve always found the concept of [Rods from God](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinetic_bombardment) (kinetic bombardment of tungsten rods dropped from orbit) fascinating.

Adding to this to really drive the point home: it doesn’t even need to be better than a human that’s good at driving. It only needs to be better than the average human driver. Anecdotally speaking, that’s not such a high bar to pass (relative to the topic at hand).

> I doubt AI will ever handle winter situations without help.

Sure it will, at least eventually. However, I suspect the humans at the time won’t like the answer: that it’s not always safe to drive in these conditions, and then the car refusing to drive autonomously, even if it is technically capable of navigating the route. It may deem the risk of getting stuck, etc. to be too high. Or you may need to accept a report to your insurance company that you’ve opted to override the safety warnings, etc.

As an Australian, I think we can walk and chew gum at the same time. So beyond your pissant deflection, do you have an actual, contributory response to the discussion?